Youth group hits gov’t failure to solve unemployment for new grads

Youth group Anakbayan criticized the government’s failure to provide adequate jobs for new college graduates and solve the growing unemployment and underemployment problem in the country.

Anakbayan national chairperson blamed the government’s economic policies and labor programs for the insufficiency of job opportunities in the country, saying that graduates nowadays are only left with three choices – either to go abroad, accept jobs which do not match their degrees or become idle.

“Every year, fresh college graduates are confronted with the same problem of job scarcity, but our government’s response has always been for the former to look for greener pastures abroad or accept its job offerings which largely fall short of any acceptable standard or measure for anyone who finished tertiary education.”

“The sad reality is, after paying large sum of money for college education, the few who manage to finish higher education are forced to any kind of job or work as caregiver or domestic helpers abroad just to earn money,” de Guzman said.

De Guzman added that the government’s own job programs are contributing to the increasing jobs-graduates mismatch and underemployment in the country.

“The government wants to create an illusion that it is solving the unemployment problem, yet the nature of jobs that it is offering our graduates, which mostly are call center or tourism jobs, do not match their undergraduate degrees. Besides, these jobs are unsustainable for graduates who want to have a permanent career.”

De Guzman cited a 2007 study conducted by the Department of Trade and Industry which shows that Filipino call center workers stay an average of 2.5 years on the job, compared with about eight to nine months for Americans, which is also on a part-time basis. Filipino call center agents only receive a fifth of their American counterparts’ salaries.

“Even call centers confess that while there seems to be a large pool of English-speaking college graduates being churned out by Philippine schools, only a few qualify. Out of 100 applicants in a call center firm, for instance, only 5 to 10 are hired.”

“If the Arroyo government is really sincere in its promise of generating six to 10 million jobs by 2010, it should address the problem of unemployment and underemployment with concrete and long-term plans and not with knee-jerk solutions,” de Guzman said. ###